IPE Competencies at U-M

What Are IPE Competencies & Levels of Exposure?

Interprofessional education (IPE) involves intentional teaching and assessment of at least one of the IPE competencies. Sub-competencies of competencies 1-4 can be found here. IPE occurs when students from two or more disciplines learn about, from, and with each other in the context of health outcomes for patients and populations.
  1. Values/Ethics: Work with team members to maintain a climate of shared values, ethical conduct, and mutual respect.
  2. Roles/Responsibilities: Use the knowledge of one’s own role and team members’ expertise to address individual and population health outcomes.
  3. Communication: Communicate in a responsive, responsible, respectful, and compassionate manner with team members.
  4. Teams and Teamwork: Apply values and principles of the science of teamwork to adapt one’s own role in a variety of team settings.
  5. Intercultural Humility: Acquire self-awareness and recognition of one’s own beliefs, biases, and behaviors that impact all aspects of team-based patient-centered care and population health, resulting in the ability to customize services when working with diverse individuals or populations.
    —Updated February 2024

Levels of Progression Towards IPE Competency:

  • Introduce: Students attain a deeper understanding of their own profession and professional identity while gaining awareness of different approaches (roles, perspectives, and values) to care. They gain early experience communicating with other professions on the healthcare team to enhance teamwork and learn about its connection to and impact on patient care delivery and population health. The experience is focused on developing the knowledge and attitudes of student learners.
  • Reinforce: Students have an understanding of their own profession and professional identity and begin to represent that role on an interprofessional team. The experience provides students with the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the different approaches (roles, perspectives, and values) to care and more advanced experience communicating with other professions on the healthcare team to enhance teamwork in service to patients and populations. The experience is furthering the knowledge and skills of student learners.
  • Practice: Students understand their own profession and professional identity and can effectively articulate and represent that role on an interprofessional team in the real-world setting and advanced simulations. The experience allows learners to further their understanding of the different approaches (roles, perspectives, and values) to care, and practice communicating with other professions on the healthcare team to enhance teamwork with the goal of improving patient and population health. The experience is furthering the knowledge and skills, and developing behaviors of student learners.

[1] Competencies 1-4 are based on the Interprofessional Education Collaborative (IPEC) Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative Practice: Version 3 (2023).
[2] Competency 5 is based on the University of Michigan’s engaged learning goal, intercultural engagement. CRLT Occasional Paper.